Avoiding straight imprinting, defining who we are and what lives we can lead, helping future Gays coming out, getting started, and not being victimized.
“ Gay people who emerge now tend to be assimilationists seeking to live like straight people” - I assume you feel this is a negative.
There is a tension between being gay (homosexual) and having a gay identity via a sharing of gay culture. I see the latter as being optional, and homosexuality as the only unifier.
I personally think the lack of gay community is a result of a lack of discrimination. Should we need to rally with each other we know we can, but for most of us, we now get to live our lives, and our concerns are parochial.
I don’t see this as an issue, but more as an end point. Unless we need to band together for safety or politics, we can be comfortable mixed in with rest of society.
I have heard it suggested that being gay is an identity/cultural, and that not all homosexuals are gay - that you have be an out and proud homosexual without any connection to the identity or culture. I would fall into that group for example.
I was wondering if you have thoughts on this ? You seem to use the term “assimilation gay” to describe homosexuals with do not conform to gay culture, and indicate this is not desirable, but why is it a problem ?
There are two things I will bring up. I will do them in separate replies. Implied in your response is that the dominate culture is a default culture without a sexual orientation.
The standard culture is a straight culture and heterosexuality permeates it. We tend not to see it since it is so everyday, envelops us and it is what we have grown up with. I discuss this in the prior chapter, so I don't expect that you have considered it.
However, my primary reply will be the other reply.
Your reply assumes that what is currently thought of as gay culture is what I am referring to.
1. I talk about Gay choices and paths and opportunities given our unique situation.
2. I talk about there are more than one choice and paths for Gay people. I discuss housing and employment as examples where there needs to be considered a Gay.
I talk about my path in which I renovated houses, had a successful academic career and a successful day job as an engineer in an advanced field. None of these things are Gay in themselves, the fact that I was able to all three was because I wasn't raising a family and was able to pursue all three.
3. I specifically point out that there would be multiple paths. Where my path was utilitarian, I pointed out circuit parties could be another cultural development. By having these two very different examples I am trying to show that there will be multiple paths in the realization of being Gay.
4. I pointed out that what Gay paths might exist remain to be discovered. We don't imagine that there might be such paths, so we haven't discovered them.
You collapsed the whole argument into whether being homosexual means you are required to participate in what is the popular idea of Gay culture. Even then I am talking about paths, life trajectories, and not specifically a culture.
I have realized in talking to people, that when assimilation is questioned they are alarmed as I state in this essay. I also notice that it is such an alarm that there is a refusal to examine the question.
I am not intended to collapse everything you have written into one argument. I think there are many gay subcultures, it was more the idea that I have come across that there is more to being gay than just homosexuality, that a degree of culture/identify is required, and your thoughts on that. For example do you see what you call assimilation gays as a potential true realisation of being gay?
For example I am not sure If I consider someone gay if they remain profoundly closeted, though they may be homosexual.
I am not alarmed by questioning of assimilation, I however see it as likely to be the default path for younger gay men, like it is for everyone else. I have read your other chapter, and agree there are some fundamental differences for us, but suspect that the generations below me may increasingly see those differences as causing less issues for them.
In reading your reply, I realize that this short snippet type of communication is limited. It could be that we don't understand each others vocabulary, that is what we mean with the words we are using. I think the younger generation will have opportunities to be Gay in new ways. Again with discrimination lessening, it isn't the end of differences being a problem but the beginning of being able to pursue new ways of being.
“ Gay people who emerge now tend to be assimilationists seeking to live like straight people” - I assume you feel this is a negative.
There is a tension between being gay (homosexual) and having a gay identity via a sharing of gay culture. I see the latter as being optional, and homosexuality as the only unifier.
I personally think the lack of gay community is a result of a lack of discrimination. Should we need to rally with each other we know we can, but for most of us, we now get to live our lives, and our concerns are parochial.
I don’t see this as an issue, but more as an end point. Unless we need to band together for safety or politics, we can be comfortable mixed in with rest of society.
I have heard it suggested that being gay is an identity/cultural, and that not all homosexuals are gay - that you have be an out and proud homosexual without any connection to the identity or culture. I would fall into that group for example.
I was wondering if you have thoughts on this ? You seem to use the term “assimilation gay” to describe homosexuals with do not conform to gay culture, and indicate this is not desirable, but why is it a problem ?
There are two things I will bring up. I will do them in separate replies. Implied in your response is that the dominate culture is a default culture without a sexual orientation.
The standard culture is a straight culture and heterosexuality permeates it. We tend not to see it since it is so everyday, envelops us and it is what we have grown up with. I discuss this in the prior chapter, so I don't expect that you have considered it.
However, my primary reply will be the other reply.
Your reply assumes that what is currently thought of as gay culture is what I am referring to.
1. I talk about Gay choices and paths and opportunities given our unique situation.
2. I talk about there are more than one choice and paths for Gay people. I discuss housing and employment as examples where there needs to be considered a Gay.
I talk about my path in which I renovated houses, had a successful academic career and a successful day job as an engineer in an advanced field. None of these things are Gay in themselves, the fact that I was able to all three was because I wasn't raising a family and was able to pursue all three.
3. I specifically point out that there would be multiple paths. Where my path was utilitarian, I pointed out circuit parties could be another cultural development. By having these two very different examples I am trying to show that there will be multiple paths in the realization of being Gay.
4. I pointed out that what Gay paths might exist remain to be discovered. We don't imagine that there might be such paths, so we haven't discovered them.
You collapsed the whole argument into whether being homosexual means you are required to participate in what is the popular idea of Gay culture. Even then I am talking about paths, life trajectories, and not specifically a culture.
I have realized in talking to people, that when assimilation is questioned they are alarmed as I state in this essay. I also notice that it is such an alarm that there is a refusal to examine the question.
I am not intended to collapse everything you have written into one argument. I think there are many gay subcultures, it was more the idea that I have come across that there is more to being gay than just homosexuality, that a degree of culture/identify is required, and your thoughts on that. For example do you see what you call assimilation gays as a potential true realisation of being gay?
For example I am not sure If I consider someone gay if they remain profoundly closeted, though they may be homosexual.
I am not alarmed by questioning of assimilation, I however see it as likely to be the default path for younger gay men, like it is for everyone else. I have read your other chapter, and agree there are some fundamental differences for us, but suspect that the generations below me may increasingly see those differences as causing less issues for them.
In reading your reply, I realize that this short snippet type of communication is limited. It could be that we don't understand each others vocabulary, that is what we mean with the words we are using. I think the younger generation will have opportunities to be Gay in new ways. Again with discrimination lessening, it isn't the end of differences being a problem but the beginning of being able to pursue new ways of being.
Thanks for taking the time to reply.
We are also from different cultures to add complexity.
Yes. That is one of the wonderful things about being Gay and also one of the things that make us different.